In most decking situations, a deck built from the ground up contains stumps, bearers, joists and decking boards. It is common practice to bolt the bearers to the stumps and screw the decking boards to the joists. With regards to attaching the joists to the bearers, in some situations, the joists are “hung” inside the bearers using joist hangers. More commonly, the joists sit on top of and at 90 degrees to the bearers.
It is common practice to simply skew-nail the joists to the bearers. Whilst this is a legal practice, the skew-nailing is often a haphazard practice—as it is done at an angle to the joist and bearer, it is often debatable just how much of the joist is actually anchored to the bearer by the nails (the nails aren't too far up from the bottom of the joists). It is also common, especially with hardwood joists, to split the joist in the skew-nailing process—making the holding power minimal at best.
There are products such as metal “triple grips”, and “uni-ties” available on the market which are frequently used to bolster the connection of the joist to the bearer. Such products work, however are very often only connected to one side of the joist to save time an the like (so often only do a partial job). They are also attached after the skew-nailing has already been completed, so is seen as a doubling up of labour.
The current practice is to use joist hangers which are folded or bent metal connectors. Due to the metal material used, the joist hangers are sufficiently strong to bear the load but the metal material is subject to deterioration in strength and integrity over time, even where the metal has been treated, such as by galvanising the metal.
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